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Edwardian Stereotypes, Social Propaganda, American Women in the Military, and the Great War

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Edwardian Stereotypes, Social Propaganda, American Women in the Military, and the Great War Southern New Hampshire University Edwardian stereotypes, social propaganda, American women in the military, and the Great War A Capstone Project Submitted to the College of Online and Continuing Education in Partial Fulfillment of the Master of Arts in History By Jimmy Lee Needham Olympia, Washington Submitted July 9, 2018 Copyright © 2018 by Jimmy Lee Needham. All Rights Reserved ii Student: Jimmy Lee Needham I certify that this student has met the requirements for formatting the capstone project and that this project is suitable for preservation in the University Archive. July 10, 2018 __________________________________________ _______________ Southern New Hampshire University Date College of Online and Continuing Education iii Abstract This is a research paper performing an in-depth examination of the power of Edwardian stereotypes and social propaganda and the lack of their effect upon American women's ability to serve in the military and military related service during the Great War. This is a worthwhile project that is of great historical importance not only to academics but of general historical interest to the public in general. Current historiography on either World War One or women’s issues lack a synthesis and cohesion that this paper will address through original scholarship and research of primary documents and examination of secondary works by academic historians versed and knowledgeable in their particular disciplines. This year marks the one hundredth anniversary of America’s involvement in this worldwide conflict. Women's service in the Great War and how it was and was not affected by the constrictive but rapidly changing social mores of the Edwardian culture is a relevant but unexplored topic. This will be an examination of primary and secondary sources that reveals the lack of recognition of resistance to the influence of the stereotypes by these women in historiological and academic research and literature. iv Dedication For grandmother and mother Blanche Sweeds and Nannette L. Needham Tireless workers and gentle hearts Figure 1: American Servicewomen in Paris (1918) © NPR Inc. v Table of Contents List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... vii Glossary ....................................................................................................................................... viii Introduction ......................................................................................................................................1 Chapter 1: Propaganda and Gender Roles .......................................................................................4 Chapter 2: Primary and Secondary Sources...................................................................................30 Chapter 3: Source Analysis ............................................................................................................45 Chapter 4: Topic Interpretation ......................................................................................................50 Chapter 5: Topic Defense ..............................................................................................................54 Conclusion .....................................................................................................................................85 Index ..............................................................................................................................................87 Bibliography ..................................................................................................................................91 vi List of Figures Figure 1: American Servicewomen in Paris (1918) ........................................................................ v Figure 2: “Victory Girls” propaganda poster (1917) ...................................................................... 9 Figure 3: Margaretha Geertruida Zelle, a.k.a. Mata Hari. ............................................................ 16 Figure 4: Portrait of Saint Joan of Arc by Sir Frank Dicksee (1918) ........................................... 18 Figure 5: Esther Sayles Root......................................................................................................... 20 Figure 6: “Why Not” Cartoon in Newport Recruit (1918) ........................................................... 24 Figure 7: Jennie Biron, USN Yeoman ........................................................................................... 46 Figure 8: Red Cross Nurse Propaganda Poster by William Souter (1917) ................................... 67 vii Glossary Bobbing: A style in which the hair is cut short and evenly all round so that it hangs above the shoulders.1 Chauny: a district in the Aisne department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. Conductorets: Feminized form of Conductor. Used for the women who filled in for the male bus, subway, cable car, and railway conductors during WWI. ‘Delilahesque’: Reference to nature of the biblical Delilah who ‘sinfully’ cut Sampson’s hair, thus robbing him of his strength. Diana: Roman goddess of the hunt. Dicksee, Sir Frank: Art Nouveau painter. Sir Francis Bernard Dicksee KCVO, PRA (1853-1928) was an English Victorian painter and illustrator, best known for his pictures of dramatic literary, historical, and legendary scenes. Painted war related Joan of Arc iconography in 1918 titled: “Joan of Arc". Edwardian: Sociographical Term applied to the reign of Edward VII. The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history 1901 to 1910. It is often extended to capture long-term sociographical trends from the 1890s to the First World War. ‘Hobble’ skirt: Restrictive form of women’s fashion that created a tight hem around the circumference of a full-length skirt, thus impeding movement that created a ‘hobbling’ gait. Iconography: the visual images and symbols used in a work of art or the study or interpretation of these. 1 This and all definitions come from the Oxford English Dictionary, accessed July 8, 2018, https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/bob. viii Peacette: “A designation specifically applied to women, being coined on analogy with the suffragettes whose active campaigns had ceased with the advent of war... (both of which come from the Daily Express in 1915), peacettes refer to the members of Sylvia Pankhurst’s Women’s Suffrage Movement who intended to attend the Women’s Congress in the Hague.”2 Propaganda: Information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular social or political cause or point of view. Sociodemographic: A term which applies to social and political trends of a particular era, such as ‘the sociodemographics of the Edwardian Era’. ‘Yeomanette’: Slang term for Female Naval Yeoman recruit. 2 Lynda Mugglestone, “Writing War and Peace in 1914-15: Pacifists, Peace-Plotters and Peacettes,” The Torch (University of Oxford 2013): accessed 6/15/2018, http://www.torch.ox.ac.uk/writing-war-and-peace-1914-15- pacifists-peace-plotters-and-peacettes. ix 1 Introduction Like any purported ‘era’ in history (keeping in mind that we as a civilization call ‘The Edwardian Era’ the ‘Edwardian Era’ simply because we as a culture intrinsically accepted the name to describe the lives of human beings living approximately one hundred years ago), and like all other ‘era’s’, gender roles and other constituents of societal behavior within them ‘stick’ as long as a majority of the society agrees that these rules are not considered arbitrary or ridiculous. When individuals within a societal norm begin to ignore them or frankly become bored with these rules, one of two things are bound to but not necessarily guaranteed to happen; either violent resistance to these changes, or the changes are so deep that they just ‘bowl over’ the preceding cultural norm. Consider the age during World War One, socially known as the Edwardian age. Common knowledge of this society would define the "average" woman at this time as being either good and dutiful or wayward and disobedient. It is safe to say the "average" male ‘kept’ his woman in line, and everyone from the man who delivered your ice to members of the president’s cabinet might and did buy into the stereotypes. Only the bold few did not. Mainstream propaganda and sociological standards made these stereotypes, and women who wished to enter military service were speaking out against them. I feel that the current historiographical record or examination of evidence of the very specific reaction of women's reactions across history to female sociopolitical propaganda, particularly war propaganda, the use of specific fashion styles, literal (written) or visual propaganda of this age has not been thoroughly examined by historians. In clarifying the difference between ‘stereotypes’ and ‘common trends’ (both of which were highly influenced by propaganda) of the Edwardian Era, a tottering and self-absorbed sociodemographic on the brink of global war, some of these 2 stereotypes were innately derogatory, as in the persistent ideology that ‘women are weak-willed’ and some reflected an ideal of how women were expected to act and behave in a society that was “intolerant and incapable of incorporating dissenting points of view” concerning what was considered the “high moral standards supposedly revered in mainstream culture [in] the United States” that the Americans abroad such as Anne Wentworth, a Red Cross nurse who was “dissillus[ioned]”
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